His voice demanded and cajoled. “Jacqueline, look at me.”
Damned if she would.
He smoothed his lips along her cheek, then kissed her neck under her ear, and nipped her lobe.
She jumped.
He laughed, his breath puffing against her skin.
In a flash, she turned her head and caught his lower lip between her teeth. She nipped, too, and released, and glared into his eyes.
“You don’t know when to surrender, do you?” he asked.
He made angry blood roil in her veins. “I won’t surrender to you again. All that got me was rejection and—”
He pushed himself the first inch inside of her.
She caught her breath in shock.
They’d done this before. They had. But it had been a long time, and he was bigger or she was smaller or . . . she’d forgotten what it was like to have a man, this man, fill her so gloriously full.
“All right?” he asked. But he didn’t wait for the answer. He pushed again. He watched her, stretched her, wordlessly commanding she forget her anger, her resistance. He demanded all of her mind and all of her senses concentrate on him, on this grandeur, on this heedless, helpless desire.
He moved so unhurriedly, she moaned with anticipation. She sank her nails into his shoulders. She tried to lift herself, to hurry him along.
But he held her trapped. His chest rested on hers. He held her tightly in his arms. Below her, the tile was cool against her still-damp body. Above her, he burned with intensity.
She couldn’t look away from his blue eyes, heavy with dark lashes and with passion, and when at last he had filled her with all of himself, she saw his flare of triumph.
But before she could gather herself to fury, he unleashed his control.
He thrust and retreated, thrust and retreated, progressing slowly at first, then with an ever-increasing rhythm. His thighs flexed against hers; his hips directed his power. She was open, wide-open, making each sensation new and fresh. With each advance, he rocked against her. With each motion, his dominion over her grew. She felt like a virgin again, taken from one marvel to another until her perceptions were overloaded. Dimly she was aware of crying out, over and over, as her soul stretched and reached, seeking release.
He slipped one hand under her head. The other rested on her belly. Close against her ear, he murmured, “Not yet, Jacqueline. Wait a little longer . . . a little longer. . . .”
Wait for what? She tried to shake her head, to deny him. If he would just stop talking and let her focus on this one moment, she would . . .
The hand on her belly glided downward and, with the coordination of a born athlete, he slipped it between them and caught her clit between his fingers. He knew her body all too well; with one unique motion, he drove her from frantic deprivation to an orgasm so intense, she screamed with pleasure.
He let her scream, listening with a faint smile, as if the sound of her ecstasy was music.
Then the spasms in her body held him captive. The rhythm between them grew in speed and strength. Another orgasm caught her up, or maybe the first one never ended. She didn’t know; she only knew he had reached the limit of his restraint, that he rested both elbows on the floor next to her, and his arms shook with the strain. She only knew that above her he panted and groaned, snared at last by the driving passion that existed between them; by the passion that went on forever.
As he thrust harder, as he came at last, he called her name, and she heard the anguish caused by their long separation . . . and in the midst of her climax, she knew that if he deemed it necessary, he would leave her again.
Chapter 5
Caleb leaned, shirtless, against the kitchen counter and watched as Jacqueline cleaned the slice she’d put into his ribs. It was jagged, it was deep, it hurt like hell—and he felt a solid sense of pride in her accomplishment. He’d taught her to fight like that, and no man alive had ever done a better job of spitting him.
Of course, no man alive distracted him like a half-naked Jacqueline. After the sex on the bathroom floor, and the sex on the lumpy mattress, she had showered alone—she had locked the bathroom door and wedged the towel cabinet behind it—and donned ugly faded plaid pajama bottoms and a clean, baggy, short-sleeved T-shirt. He supposed that was her naïve way of saying Hands off.
Instead she looked sweet and clean, and smelled of soap and Jacqueline.
The California sun had loved her, caressed her, leaving her skin a beautiful pale tan color. As her hair dried, wisps of pale blond curled around her face and the ends kissed her neck. The shirt had a faded logo for Artie’s Giant Ball of Twine, one of the first places she’d worked when she ran away, and her arms were buff. She’d been working out.
Of course.
He’d taught her to do that, too.
“You need stitches,” she said for the tenth time.
And for the tenth time, he replied, “The scissors are new and clean, my tetanus shot is up-to-date, and I can get antibiotics in New York City. Just put a butterfly bandage on it. Then start packing.”
She dabbed the paper towels into the basin of clean warm water, then carefully wiped the area around the wound. She didn’t look up, didn’t respond in any way.
His gaze shifted to the fingerless leather gloves she wore. They were well-made, almost the color of her skin, and supple enough to move as she moved. “You didn’t used to wear gloves all the time.”
“I still don’t. Not all the time.”
“Why wear them at all?”
“You heard me today in the wine cellar. It’s a combination of style and protection.”
“Protection?” He mocked her openly. “From the corkscrew, you mean.”
This Jacqueline was wiser than the teenager he’d known, less likely to rise to the bait, more inclined to take her own time in answering him—or not answer him at all. “How did you find me?” she asked.
He laughed sharply, and winced at the pain that brought. “We never lost you.” He had tracked her from the East Coast to the West Coast, through hardship and good times, for two long years of exile.
She picked up the scissors.
Although perhaps he could have been more tactful about saying so. He tensed, prepared to fend off another attack.
She glanced up and saw him watching warily. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to stab you again.” She cut strips of first aid tape and hung them on the edge of the Formica. “I mean, what else could you do to me? Screw me again?”
“I did not screw you,” he said precisely. Did she think he had forgotten the second time, when she took control, led him to the bed, shoved him down, and mounted him? Did she dare imagine he would not cherish the familiar, sweet madness that gripped them both, the way she took him inside of her, the way he felt as he thrust, and thrust, and thrust, wanting nothing more than to have her today, yesterday, and every day of his life?
He never supposed that a man’s thoughts resembled anything like a woman’s, but for once, they must have been on the same track, for she said, “No. I suppose you didn’t.”
“And yes, if given the chance, I could do it again.”
She didn’t laugh. He hadn’t been here long enough to tell for sure, but this Jacqueline didn’t even seem to smile, and that was a change he didn’t like.
“You could, huh? I suppose. Because it has been two years. That’s a long abstinence.” One by one, she cut the strips of tape into the butterfly shapes. “But I suppose I’m the only one who refrained.”
He didn’t answer. There was no point. No answer he made would make her happy.
For all her hostility, she used a gentle touch as she pulled the skin together and applied the first bandage. “She sent you, didn’t she?”
“Your mother? Yes.”
“It’s the time of Choosing.”
“Yes.”
“I’m not going back.”
He didn’t answer that, either. She would go back whether she liked it or not.
Jacqueli
ne layered another bandage across the jagged cut. “How is she?”
“Your mother? She’s fine.”
“I read about her in the tabloids. She’s divorced again.”
“Yes.”
“Why this time?”
“I don’t ask.”
“That’s right. Because it’s none of your business.”
“No.”
“You merely do whatever she tells you to do.”
“For which she pays me very well.” An excuse. Normally he would never make an excuse, but Jacqueline always got to him.
And as involved as Jacqueline was in her own bitterness, she didn’t even notice. “I’d venture to say she got a divorce for the same reason she always gets a divorce. Because she’s bored. And she’s got a new boyfriend.”
“Why do you care? You barely met the last husband.”
“I don’t care. I just wish that for once she’d act her age.” Picking up a large sterile gauze pad, Jacqueline savagely tore it open. “I suppose that’s too much to ask.”
In the last two years, Jacqueline had changed, had grown up in every way but one—she still despised her mother for being who she was. He could have told her that was a waste of time. He’d learned the hard way that parents were as human as anyone else, and sometimes their mistakes had dire consequences.
But Jacqueline wouldn’t listen to him. She despised him, too. Despised him and loved him at the same time. It was a painful combination of emotions for him to watch, and for her to live with. He wished . . . Well, it was far too late for him to undo what he had done, and if he had the chance, he knew he’d do it all over again. Apparently, he could resist everything except temptation—and Jacqueline was the only temptation in his life.
She finished taping the gauze over the wound and stepped back to examine her handiwork. She nodded as if pleased. Then her gaze wandered across his shoulders, his chest, his belly. . . .
God. What she did to him.
And what he did to her. For she closed her amber brown eyes for one betraying moment, and turned away. “You can put on your T-shirt now.”
He reached for it.
“And leave.” She walked across the miniature kitchen and dining room and toward the door.
His hand hovered an inch above his shirt. Deliberately misunderstanding her, he asked, “You want to leave now?”
“I told you. I’m not going.” She was smart enough to know she should keep an eye on him, so she turned back to face him. “I mean, what are you going to do? Shove me screaming and yelling through airport security?” Placing her hand on the knob, she said, “I don’t think so.”
Gently, he told her, “I don’t have to take you through security. Your mother’s new . . . boyfriend . . . loaned her his jet. It’s sitting at the airport, fueled and ready to fly.”
Jacqueline took a sharp breath, obviously torn between arguing the issue of her mother’s boyfriend or her own return.
He didn’t wait. “You have until tomorrow to make up your mind.”
“My mind is already made up.”
“Then—you have until tomorrow to change it. Until then—”
She saw the look in his eyes and, prey to his predator, froze for a fatal moment.
He took the two long steps that put him in front of her. Smoothly, he lifted her hand off the knob, carried it to his lips, and kissed her fingers. “Until then, I know what I would like to do.”
“What?” Her hostility was apparent, in her stance, in her tone, in her expression.
But her desire glowed like an ember. He had only to breathe it to life, and she would be his. He leaned closer, pressing her against the door, and kissed her, a slow exploration that gained in heat and light with each moment, with each touch. Against her lips, he whispered, “I want to do this. All day, and all night. With you.”
She drew in a breath to speak.
He didn’t let her. He slid his fingers into her hair, that remarkable white blond that glowed like platinum and sparkled like diamonds. Tilting her face up, he kissed her until she forgot everything but him, kissed her until he existed only for her. He kissed her resistance away.
Yet when he lifted his lips away, he discovered he was wrong, for she said, “I won’t go back.”
She would. It was his job to make her.
But for now . . . Their only concern was each other. Only each other.
And the rest of the world could go to hell.
Chapter 6
If Aaron Eagle had had any doubt about the insanity of the people who ran the Gypsy Travel Agency, being brought into the lowest level of the New York subways and being told to stand inside a carefully drawn chalk circle pretty well settled the matter. The board of directors was certifiable, every last one of them, and if he didn’t have his own reasons for giving in to their stupid attempt at blackmail, he would be out of here.
Unfortunately, his reasons were good. Better than good.
So he stood here and watched while some weird old woman directed the other five suckers to take care as they stepped in, and not smudge the chalk. Yeah, because if they smudged the chalk, something awful might happen, like all the New Yorkers who hurried past on their way home from work would stare at the odd mix of people high-stepping into a chalk circle underneath a subway stair. Hell, as long as no one got in the way, New Yorkers didn’t give a damn if Aaron and his new-found compatriots gathered to perform Riverdance. Which Aaron truly hoped wasn’t the next order of business, because he had to draw the line somewhere.
His gaze landed on the pristine, just-swept concrete floor enclosed by red and blue chalk, and he laughed, brief and bitter.
No, he wasn’t going to draw any line. As long as this kept him safe, he was their man.
He was Aaron Eagle. He had given his word, and he always kept it. He only hoped to hell they would keep theirs.
One of the two females stepped up, offered her hand, and shook his enthusiastically. “Hi, I’m Charisma Fangorn from Oregon. Isn’t this great? I can’t wait for the party tonight.”
“The party?” Remembering what he’d been told, he said, “At the Gypsy Travel Agency headquarters, you mean.”
“Everyone associated with the organization comes in for it. All the old Chosen and all the old directors. There is a huge feast—think Hogwarts at Halloween—and lots of drinking and dancing, and then there’s a ceremony where we’re formally presented to the group.” Her eyes shone with excitement.
“Sounds like a lot of silliness to me,” he said, then felt a pang when her face fell. This was why he made it a policy not to hang with young women like this one. The Heidi outfit, studded dog collar and long black hair streaked with purple made him feel old—or at least older than his thirty-two years.
“But they have to present us, or the Chosen Ones from former years might mistake us for, you know”—she glanced around and whispered—“one of the Others.”
“They could simply send our pictures around in an e-mail.” Then he wouldn’t have to be there for what sounded like a fraternity hazing.
“What if the e-mail is intercepted and the Others discover our identities?”
“Aren’t they going to figure us out eventually?”
“Yes, but this gives us time to train under experienced Chosen.” Which did make sense. Then her dimples peeked out. “Besides, the presenting is a tradition.”
Yielding to her gusto, he said, “As long as it’s tradition, then it must be done.”
“Yes. In an organization like this, it’s tradition that binds the company together. I read that in When the World Was Young: A History of the Chosen Ones.”
“Right.” The board of directors had presented him with a leather-bound copy, too. It had just never occurred to him to read it.
“Once my mother realized I had a gift, she held a few séances, but of course, I don’t have that kind of a gift.” She took a place next to him and surveyed the others with enthusiasm. “I do stones.”
She said it like he was su
pposed to know what she was talking about. “Stones.”
“Crystals, mostly.” She jangled the gold and silver bracelets that wrapped her wrists. “I can hear them sing.”
“Sing.” He noted the different-colored rocks attached to each bangle, and beneath them, the tattoos. Only he would be willing to bet that they hadn’t been put there deliberately. Maybe they had spontaneously sprung up during adolescence. Or maybe she’d been born with them.
He only knew the manner in which the mark had appeared on him. Who knew how it worked with the others?